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MSC Cruises (part of Mediterranean Shipping Company S.A. – MSC) with headquarters in Naples, Italy, was founded in 1987. Before that, in 1960’s Achille Lauro founded a cruise line called Lauro Lines, from which MSC Cruises were born. In that era, there were only two ships operating – Angelina Lauro and Achille Lauro. Unfortunately, you can’t go on a cruise with either of these two, since they both sunk. Achille Lauro sunk in 1996. near coast of South Africa because of a fire (all passengers were saved).


Their biggest competitor is Costa Cruises, since both of them are in Italy. Few years ago, Costa Cruises was bought by Carnival Cruises, and since then, Costa plan and construct their ships with much similarities to Carnival Cruises. On the other hand, MSC Cruises are making and designing their own ships. They made a huge breakthrough in 1990s for organizing low cost but high quality cruises.

MSC Cruises Fleet

  • MSC Armonia
  • MSC Sinfonia
  • MSC Lirica
  • MSC Opera
  • MSC Musica
  • MSC Orchestra
  • MSC Poesia
  • MSC Fantasia (Flagship)
  • MSC Splendida
  • MSC Melody (previously called Melody only)

Ships under construction:

  • MSC Magnifica (2010)
  • MSC Meraviglia (2011)
  • MSC Favolosa (2012)

* Cruise Expert is curently building a huge database with all ships descriptions, guides and pictures… check it soon ;)

MSC Cruises

MSC Cruises

MSC Cruise Destinations

Their main terrain is of course Mediterranean, and some of their stops are: Italy, Greece, Malta, Canary Islands, Croatia, Portugal, Morocco, Spain, Istanbul and even the Ukraine. There are more and more cruises in Northern Europe…

Some more info

Interesting thing to know is that Sophia Loren, famous actress was a godmother ta all MSC ships which are made after MSC Lirica.

On all MSC Cruises ships strong Italian-influenced ambient is present. They mainly sail in Mediterranean, so their passengers are mostly from Europe. There is more and more people from UK and Ireland every day. On MSC Cruises in Caribbean, more than 90% people is from USA. All announcements on ships are spoken in Italian, French, Spanish, German and English language.

Italian food and good wines are one sure thing on MSC Cruises.